With the upcoming launch on October 22nd of the newest Windows OS,
Apple's Senior VP of Marketing, Phil Schiller, sees a huge opportunity
for Cupertino to snag a few more customers away from Redmond. "It
presents a very good opportunity for us."
One such tactic is
explained thus. "Any user that reads all [these] steps is probably
going to freak out," Schiller explains. What steps? Well XP users who
want to upgrade will have to save all their documents and data to an
external hard drive, reformat their PC's hard drive, install Windows 7,
then reload all their software and all their documents. And somewhere
around 80% of Windows users are still on XP as opposed to Vista. Notes
Schiller, "If you have to go through all that, why not just buy a Mac?"
The process does sound rather complicated and time-consuming,
though Apple may have an uphill battle in a depressed economy. While
users may be put off by the hassles in reinstalling software, the
question remains whether or not they'll want to purchase the higher-end
Mac as well as all new Mac versions of software they already own in a
PC iteration.
Schiller didn't state whether or not Apple was
planning any specific sales around Windows 7's launch date nor did he
mention any price reductions, though such a short-term move might pay
off with long-term dividends. Convincing users of Mac's better safety
against virii and other malware and its greater operating stability are
only of limited appeal, but paired with price cuts the effect could
dampen Microsoft's sales numbers.
The one thing you can count
on, though, will be all new pitches targeting Windows users with older,
limping along XP machines wary of upgrading after the disaster of
Vista. We expect to see returning characters of Mac (Justin Long) and
PC (John Hodgman) get in on the action sooner rather than later.
benet
November 10, 2009 at 11:22pm
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Quayzar
October 20, 2009 at 10:08pm
Windows 7 is the best OS Microsoft has ever released but we are taking about Microsoft here. I have used it and liked it and if you compare it to XP it is a massive advancement and is so much better but that is what makes it look so good. XP and Vista really were disappointments and Vista so much so that people forgot how bad ME was. The hype played to Microsoft's much maligned detriment however now because of the Vista disaster Microsoft is able to hype a product that doesn't suck by comparing it so favourably to the butt of tech jokes for the last two years. Lets be honest though. Vista was just Microsoft trying to shove a product out when there was so much criticism of XP's age so to be fair Windows 7 should be compared to XP the last serious Windows release and so far thats what people are doing and most find Windows 7 is years ahead of XP but If I compared Snow Leopard to Mac OS 10.0 I would think Snow Leopard is even more amazing and that is what makes things a bit more complicated. Microsoft made up a lot of ground all at once which makes it look like Microsoft reinvented the OS but in fact all they did was take 8 years to make the product they should have had for the Vista launch and the Vista launch should have happened in 2005. However regardless of when Microsoft should have released 7 they have but if Microsoft kept advancing and releasing updates at the rate of Apple since XP Microsoft would look like it has plateaued and is now only adding minor tweaks to the way to GUI works. But because they made such a massive leap all at once Mac OS is now looking like it has plateaued when in fact it is just continuing to be developed as fast as ever it's just not changing in such massive leaps all at once especially since Snow Leopard to the untrained eye so closely resembles Leopard which came out 2 years ago against the lack lustre Vista. To the average user the code that has been better optimised than ever before and that the fact the foundation of the OS is setup to just get better and better with time and newer technology makes little or no difference now. Sure Mac OS will with more cores and better graphics cards blow Windows 7 out of the water but for the time being GHz make more a difference than processing cores and that plays right to Windows 7's hand. Unfortunately to the average user .dll hell is a non-starter and as long as they can get their Facebook status updated and watch YouTube they are happy and with the improvements to Window management, stability, and security Windows 7 is the first Microsoft OS in years that isn't a blight on the PC World. It appears to be actually bringing something to the table against Apple's years of more advanced window/app management. So even if the Windows 7 advancement is mostly skin deep excluding stability obviously since that was all under the hood work, though it's under the hood work that should have been done 5 to 8 years ago, Windows 7 is going to be successful in making Microsoft look competent for the first time since the 90's. I think that is better for all of us as it will make Apple work even harder because if Microsoft products appear on par "even if they are not" with Apple's Apple will work as hard as possible to leap frog them once again.
Can't wait to see a desirable tablet computer.
facevalue83
October 20, 2009 at 8:27am
My wife's computer more than meets the requirements to run the 64-bit Windows 7 Ultimate (2.46ghz 64-bit dual core processor, 4gb of ram, and 320gb hard drive) which only requires a 2ghz processor, 2gb of ram and 20gb of available space, yet it will not install because her computer had a 32-bit version of Vista. Her computer won't even accept the 64-bit disc. I volunteered for a Windows 7 release party just so she could upgrade for free, but we can only install 32-bit Ultimate. So disappointing. To think Walt Mossberg said Windows 7 is superior to Snow Leopard. My MacBook with a 2ghz processor and 2gb of ram and only a 250gb hard drive does everything faster than my wife's PC. It did when comparing Vista to Leopard, it still does comparing Windows 7 to Snow Leopard.
chrisrmottram
October 20, 2009 at 5:30am
With all the hype around Windows 7 and the issues with upgrading Windows PCs to the new '7', I can thank my lucky stars that I made the change to Mac. I have the new MacBook Pro 13". It beats my work PC hands down in all areas of performance. I wish tmy Company would make the change to Mac.
Keep up the great work guys...
Chris
Doha, Qatar
Middle East
